Helena left the pilot fiddling with his settings and controls, diplomatically allowing her time to examine the contents of the parcel in privacy. Regardless of its importance she needed to attend to other tasks before she could focus on it properly. Walking to the edge of the ocean she put her hand into the small breakers languidly pushing themselves onto the beach. She knew she should check for food before she started, but her errand was too urgent to worry about how she’d feel afterwards.
Helena brought up her Secondary and Tertiary AIs. She instructed them to build her a small communications dish out of the salts, silicon dioxide and water surrounding her hand. Her Primary AI warned her that she would need to eat an extra two thousand calories to offset the energy they required to meet her demand.
Untold numbers of nanomachines swam out from her fingers to begin the recombination of the raw ingredients lying around her. Seconds passed and small geometric lines could be made out in the water, close to the surface of the shifting sand. Funnels of sand spiralled up from the bed into growing struts. Water cascaded around the scaffolding units as a parabolic dish took shape.
Seconds later her Tertiary AI signalled that it was time to move her hand. She withdrew it and stood up, turning to see the pilot watching her. She graced him with a small smile as she walked back to the hopper where she opened different storage compartments in a search for food. She was out of luck. The only items she turned up were the torches, flares, pistols and other odds and ends the pilot would need if he were downed.
“Ma’am?” asked the pilot, leaning against the nose of the hopper. He’d taken his helmet off and tucked it under his left arm.
“What?” she asked testily, already feeling the effects of low blood sugar.
“Ma’am, food is in the back.” He stood upright, walked around the side of the hopper, placing his helmet in the cockpit as he went. The pilot opened a small panel behind his seat to reveal ration packs. He did not get them out; he just showed her where they were then stood back.
She nodded her gratitude in return. The packs were simple, dried basic foods and base compounds for more exotic dishes if given enough time and nanomachines.
Then her eyes alighted on the prize, a chocolate bar.
She tore it open. Her fingers shook uncontrollably, revealing how weak she felt. The chocolate was too fatty for her tastes but it was exactly what she needed. She could feel the pilot watching her again.
Helena left the pilot, returning to the shoreline. A small dish bobbed in the waves, her project complete. Bending down, she let her nanomachines return home. Once they were on board, she scooped up the dish in her free hand, holding the last of the chocolate in the other.
Bleached white sands stretched back from the shore for twenty metres or so, ending at the tree line. A narrow belt of rocks and rotting kelp marked the high tide line. Heading up the gentle incline of the beach, Helena placed the dish on a large flat block of granite. Letting her Tertiary AI guide her alignment of the dish with one of Euros’s satellites, she waited until an open communication channel was detected then left it there with the dial tone ringing.
Satisfied she could now manage the contents of the package she returned to the hopper. The pilot had wandered off, down to the shoreline. He stood with his feet just beyond the reach of the waves as they gently lapped against the sand. Helena watched him as he looked down, playing a game of chicken with the foaming rush around his toes.
The contents of the package consisted of a letter wrapped around a single datastore. She pocketed the store then read the letter.
Helena, please find enclosed details of the child’s whereabouts: Classified, for your eyes only. The data dump will respond to your genetic code.
Be advised elements within Indexiv are searching for the information contained therein. This is a matter of utmost urgency, Euros CEO Dickinson has authorised this action.
What action, wondered Helena before reading further.
Find and recover the child. Convey him to London. Further instructions will find you there.
FYI, elements within Euros are seeking appropriation of child. Do not deviate from the instructions written here. Deliver child in person. Do not interfere with child, danger of death.
Your efforts are gratefully acknowledged.
It was signed by the office of Euros’s assistant chief executive, Hal Lanais.
Helena put the letter on the seat beside her. She retrieved the datastore from her pocket. As she did so, the letter dissolved into so many nanomachines, filling the air with a smell of burnt wood.
She checked that her Primary AI had recorded the image of the letter and assigned it to a secure data location. She clicked her tongue to seal the location with a password based on her genetic makeup. Only Helena could now open it and, even then, only if the AI believed she was under no duress. It was about as safe as it could be, given her resources.
Stepping out of the hopper, she saw the pilot sitting with his legs out at the water’s edge. He had an actual book in his hands and was reading. She was amazed at how calm he was given what had happened in the last twenty-four hours. She’d half expected him to ignore her attempt to take charge and fly them to the nearest military base. She didn’t really understand why he’d not done so but was thankful he’d rolled with it.
The image of him relaxing, minding his own business, reminded her of holidays on the Breton coast during the summers when different members of her family would drop in on each other at an old family home they had there. The Atlantic sea washing away the stresses they brought with them.
Helena let out a sigh of despair when she saw what was on the datastore. The only unencrypted data were global positioning coordinates detailing the location of the boy. The rest of it was simply reams of nonsense. She routed the coordinates through her Tertiary AI and uploaded the destination via her makeshift satellite uplink.
The boy was in a small town called Swakupmund on the west coast of the Southern African States. The town was nearly two hundred kilometres due west of the provincial capital Windhoek.
The Western Province, formerly Namibia, had a population of eighty-five thousand.
She shook her head. The African continent was a wasteland. Decimated by disease and political instability more than two centuries ago, it had never recovered.
She shook her head. It was the one continent to which she’d never been. She accessed her personal account at the diplomatic bureau and downloaded information on the Southern Africa States, specifically requesting data on transport routes, population centres and maps: lots of maps, in multiple scales, using a variety of filtering techniques, including technology and peace time military forces distributions. In another time and place she’d have happily spent the day crawling over the maps for her own curiosity.
Finishing up, she checked her messages. There was one from her uncle, dated an hour ago. She didn’t bother to read it. Had he saved her life, or had he been on the verge of threatening it? Helena knew he was ruthless and, regardless of their relationship, she had no doubts that he would brush her aside if he felt it justified. She did not have the time to worry her way through to a decision on whether she could trust him. Besides, the letter from Hal Lanais was explicit in its details. Johannes was not a part of that direction.
It would have been preferable to have enough bandwidth to hide her activity, but Helena resigned herself to being content that the closest anyone would come to her destination was an area over eight hundred thousand square kilometres in size. She hoped that, if they were looking, it would give her enough time to be somewhere else when they came.
She shut the link down, ordered the dish to de-compose. Helena suspected the datastore had release conditions that would result in further information unlocking upon reaching her destination. There was nothing for her to do but to wait and see.
Watching the pilot to see what he was doing, Helena took the opportunity to check her own status. Her reserves had been stabilised by the chocolate bar.
Good. Her only remaining concern was to do with the hopper and its pilot. The hopper was blatantly identifiable as air-force ordnance with its ident in digital and normal lettering across its sides and top. It would throw out our friend or foe calls to every craft and network it came across. It was only a matter of time before her uncle had them tracking her down.
I don’t know the pilot’s name, his skills or whether he’s going to manage whatever I’ve got ahead of me. God, I don’t know if I’m going to manage it. Fuck, what’s the range of the Hopper? Why did Ngasi have to make this personal?
The pilot was still reading, laid out on his back in the sun.
She was not reassured by her loneliness. Having another member of the diplomatic bureau along for the ride would have made life much easier. He uncle would never have dared to detain two of them.
Nevertheless, she was going to have to make do with a normal human being.
Schmerl had made it quite clear that Indexiv knew where the boy was being kept. Helena doubted that she’d be able to reach him in time, even if she had access to an atmospheric shuttle. Which I don’t.
Helena called out to the pilot, who sat holding his book above his head. He strained his neck trying to see her. Catching her position, he flipped the book shut and got to his feet.
“Yes, ma’am?”
“What’s the range of this thing?” she asked, indicating the hopper with an upturned hand.
“’Bout a thousand clicks, ma’am,” said the pilot, looking up into the sky, as if trying to gauge how far that was.
“And we’ve done?”
“Nine hundred or so, ma’am.” He cocked his head to one side, trying to second-guess her.
She wiped her forehead with the back of her hand. Even she was starting to sweat in the unrelenting heat. She stopped at the hopper, tapped her fingers rhythmically on the polyglass window of the passenger seat door, thinking. She asked her Tertiary AI whether there was a military base within the range of the depleted aircraft.
Howard Air Force base, an official Australasian military compound, lay thirty kilometres to the north. Her gut told her the risks were no worse than flying back to her uncle’s apartment. She asked her Primary AI to perform a risk assessment for her.
The pilot opened the hatch on his side and climbed in, running some sort of activity through the hopper’s computers.
“Ma’am,” he said.
She ignored him.
“Ma’am,” he said again, no more forcefully. She turned away from the cockpit, trying to concentrate on how she was going to get transport from Australasia across to Southern Africa. He got the message and said nothing more.
The AI came back none the wiser, suggesting a deeper search to process additional factors that might allow a more conclusive result. Helena gave it permission.
The pilot started up the engine. Helena whipped around in alarm.
“What do you think you’re doing?” she asked, frightened lest he had decided to return to a military base alone. He was the only known survivor of the Amazon Fell. Euros’s generals would definitely wish to debrief him on the attack and loss of the Amazon.
“Incoming, ma’am. I’m under the impression you wish to avoid them.” He did not bother to turn to her, not even when she scrambled inside the hopper and he took them into the air.
“Where are we going?” she asked him.
“Howard Air Force base, ma’am, Australasian territory. They will not follow.”
She looked over her shoulder, suddenly afraid they were just behind. She felt foolish for not having asked him earlier.
“They cannot be visually confirmed yet, ma’am; still sixty clicks away.” The pilot must have been looking for them to have been alerted so early to their presence.
“Do they know we’re here?” she asked tentatively, not entirely happy about putting her life so completely in his hands.
“Yes, ma’am.” said the pilot
Neither said anything more as they sped north.
The pilot was advised of his approach ten kilometres out of Howard. With each passing second, Helena grew more agitated. She did not let the pilot see her worry, carefully controlling her hormone release and perspiration, but privately she fully expected to see an honour guard waiting to whisk her straight back to Johannes.
The base was not large, no more than a couple of kilometres on each side. It was primarily contained underground in the centre of the compound, with much of the surface left to run wild. A canopy of eucalyptus and brushbox palms stood some thirty metres above the ground. Those small parts of the base that broke above the surface showed only grey hangar entrances or chimneys amongst the bush. A long runway sat to the eastern side of the base running from south to north, stretching away beyond the edges of Helena’s vision. She allowed her hopes to rise as she realised the base might punt shuttles into orbit.
The pilot brought them in with a casual grace as a small pad was freed up near the radar tower towards the north-eastern edge of the base.
They were greeted by a Commander Lancaster. Lancaster was an administrator at heart, his rigid posture, clasped hands and flattened black hair a testament to a life of order and precision.
“It’s a pleasure to have you with us, ma’am,” he said as she stepped out of the passenger door that a technician had opened for her.
He has a weasel’s smile, thought Helena: thin lips and tiny teeth. Lancaster might be officious but he was alone. Nor did he make any suggestions about escorting her back to Johannes. Helena wondered what the pilot had told the base regarding the circumstances of their arrival and felt a flash of gratitude at his circumspection on her behalf. The pilot disembarked from the hopper behind her. Helena smiled to herself as she pictured him cuddling up to it at night.
“Thank you,” she said to Lancaster.
“Your pilot conveyed your message about the atmospheric shuttle. We’re having one primed for you now. Sorry it was not ready for when you arrived. The Australasian Government sends its best wishes.” He smiled again. She noted his eyes were slightly narrowed.
“Good,” was all she allowed herself to say. He knows more than he’s telling, she thought. She considered the studied blankness of his expression; regardless of his smiles, he was cooperating in spite of himself. She looked over at the pilot, doubly pleased at his ingenuity. As they walked through the base, towards the elevators that would take them into its heart, the pilot avoided her gaze.
The lift accessed thirty-three subterranean floors. Their destination was a hydroponics garden with internal lighting that was indistinguishable from the sunlight outside. The commander led them through beds of cacti and desert brush. If it were not for the visible ceiling, it would have been difficult to tell that they were eighty metres underground.
Stopping them somewhere in its depths, the commander turned to her.
“Lady Woolf, I am instructed to advise you that the Australasian Government wishes you to know it supports your efforts to find the boy.” With this, he led them onwards, lifting a large stray palm leaf that had fallen partially across their path as he went.
Helena knew he had nothing more to say on the matter. The Commander did not even know who the boy he referred to was, even if, unbelievably from her perspective, his employer did.
Like a jilted lover, it seems I’m the last to know, she thought ruefully. She considered herself a successful diplomat, a career she’d prospered in through having a fine talent for gathering useful information. Right then she felt as if everyone else knew what was happening and she was the chump being maneuvered around the board.
Trying to regain her sense of control, she asked the commander who would be piloting the shuttle. The commander hesitated, his stride faltered, but he caught himself before a normal human would have noticed.
“Ha ha. Of course, your own pilot is licensed,” came his response. “You may let him pilot if you wish; our crew is happy to stand down at your request.”
The excursion
to the hydroponics floor was just a diversion, the commander wanted time and space to deliver his message.
She held her breath and waited for him to come clean.
“Ma’am, can I speak freely?” asked Commander Lancaster.
Helena nodded absently. She was more concerned with where she would obtain a jumpsuit of her own.
“We have word from Euros that you are not to leave this base until Director Johannes Woolf arrives.” Helena’s blood froze, but the commander wasn’t finished. “For the good of all, the Australasian Government has given you free passage, so we will not stop you from departing.”
“I understand. Commander, where can I get my jumpsuit from?” asked Helena. No one wants me here a moment longer than absolutely necessary.
“Through there,” the commander pointed across the hangar, underneath the heat-darkened belly of the shuttle. Helena noticed a pair of cybernetically altered technicians working on the shuttle’s undercarriage. They were replacing one of the tyres on its rear starboard undercarriage. Helena watched them for a moment, giving the commander another chance to broach the subject he wanted to tackle. She hoped to learn as much from him as she could. The right arm of each technician had been replaced with multi-use tools. They were the lowest of the low, too poor to even afford implants that would have preserved their humanity and their dignity. There was a leaden stench of rocket fuel in the air, distasteful and probably poisonous after any prolonged length of time. Both she and the commander were fortunate enough to have nanomachines that were capable of filtering out any poisons before they were ingested by the body. The technicians relied on facemasks to protect them from the fumes.
The AGS Dreamtime was an unarmed cargo shuttle registered with the Australasian Air Force. The one hundred and fifty-metre-long ship sat squarely in the shuttle bay. Its matt white hull was dully illuminated in the low intensity strip lighting running through the hangar. Slicks of liquid hydrogen, spurting noisily from the hoses fuelling the ship, were mopped up by puddles of nanomachines before they could explode.
A Family War: The Oligarchy - Book 1 Page 5
